by By Nancy Mills, USA WEEKEND

by By Nancy Mills, USA WEEKEND

Christopher Meloni saunters into the interview room looking like one tough guy. A bouncer at a Greenwich Village club back in the day, the former Detective Elliott Stabler of Law & Order: Special Victims Unit radiates intensity. But instead of a gun, he is wearing a stylish fedora hinting at his mischievous side.

Meloni, 52, a natural at striking an intimidating presence on screen, seems perfect as the title character in Fox's new family comedy, Surviving Jack, launching March 27. New to at-home parenting when his wife starts law school, the title character has very specific ideas about how to be a dad to two teens.

"Jack calls it like he sees it," Meloni says. "He's very clear in his opinions. His heart is in the right place, although you might not always agree with him. You can say, 'That wasn't called for,' but he's not a mean guy. When he engages with his kids, he wants to go to the edge. He's intrusively proactive."

Meloni's own approach to fatherhood is more about persuasion than force. He and his wife, production designer Doris Sherman Williams, have two children - Sophia, almost 13, and Dante, 10. He gives an example of how he and his TV character differ.

"My daughter found out that dance wasn't being offered at her school this semester, so she wasn't going to have a sport," Meloni explains. "We said, 'You have to do something.' She decided on ballet, and we guided her on how to do that.

"Jack would have said, 'What are you doing about sports? Nothing? Yeah, you are! I signed you up for ballet.'"

Even though it's just March, Meloni is now planning the family's summer vacation. "My wife and I are trying to decide whether it will be an adventure vacation like camping, rafting and maybe rock climbing with the kids," he says. "Or are we going to take them on a cultural vacation? That's a tough one. It's a lot of money to spend with kids' eyes glazing over and complaining. If we do that, we're leaning toward Turkey and Venice. We recently went to Egypt, and it was so different and exotic."

If they can't decide, the fallback plan is spending time at their lakeside vacation home in Connecticut. "I water ski," Meloni says, "and the kids have their friends up. Friends come over, and I'll grill up some steaks. If it's cool enough, we'll sleep with the windows open. It's a throwback, idyllic way to grow up.

"When I was a kid, we never went on a legitimate family vacation. We went to visit grandparents or we went to medical meetings," says Meloni, the son of a stern doctor. "That's why the lake, to me, is so special. I always had it in my head, 'That's the way it should be. That would make a child happy.' As an adult, I thought, 'I now want to live my childhood.' "

What kind of dad is Meloni? "I think my kids would call me a little crazy," he says. "I'm very physical, very affectionate. I'm also very disciplined and focused on education. That's one thing that was instilled in me, one place in life where there's no compromise.

"I want them to engage in athletics or the arts because those are places they get to express themselves. My daughter is challenged by the piano. I've tried to make it like this: 'We've committed to the piano, but if you don't want to practice we'll pull the plug.' She said, 'I'll give it another shot.' I try to encourage that and say, 'Please trust me. Wondrous things will happen on this journey of pain.' "

Meloni can't help laughing at himself. "What works for me is empowering my kids," he says. "I remember not having any power when I was growing up. Power helps kids mature, and it requires critical thinking on their part. They feel engaged in a decision, which makes them feel engaged in the family process."

Much of Meloni's child-rearing approach is a pushback against the way he was raised in the Washington, D.C., area.

"My father would say, 'You can blah blah blah all you want, but this is the assignment. Do the assignment.'

"I wasn't a lazy kid. I just wanted to do other stuff. I had learning issues. I wanted to get it done, and I think I was relatively smart, but there were certain connections my brain wouldn't make."

In addition to Surviving Jack, Meloni has four films opening this year. In They Come Together, he plays "the CEO of a giant candy company who wants to crush Amy Poelher's tiny candy shop." In White Bird in a Blizzard, he plays a husband whose wife disappears. In the thriller Sin City: A Dame to Kill For, he is a detective, and in the comedy Small Time, a used-car salesman.

He stumbled into acting when he took a drama class at the University of Colorado and remembers quitting college briefly to ride his motorcycle to Hollywood, hoping to become a star. No one paid any attention then.

"I remember having to call home to borrow $500," he says. "My father made me pay it back to the penny. He told me, 'This is important.' What he meant was, 'You did what you needed to do. It cost a lot in so many ways - emotionally, physically and financially - but you did it. You honored your word and lived the life you wanted to live.'"